Keywords

Consumer Innovativeness, Shopping Style, India, Marketing Strategy.

Introduction

Innovation is a well-thought-out critical competitive capability for businesses Andries et al. (2009); Nishitani & Itoh (2016) and is an imperative aspect of global trade and industry progression Sohag et al. (2015). Newfangled and pioneering products and services can add to an enterprise’s progression, competitive advantage and lucrativeness (Guoxin et al., 2014; Visnjic et al. (2016) and advance purchaser consummation Pan & Nguyen (2015). One of the rudimentary philosophies of sustainable marketing is pioneering marketing focusing on probing for novel and superior marketing contributions Esfahani & Reynolds (2021). Marketers have long acknowledged the importance of innovative consumers as one of the substantial market fragments.

One of the ways through which firms try to institute their triumph in the marketplace is by launching and marketing newfangled products proficiently and effectually by aiming at these innovative patrons Cowart et al. (2008). Initial adopters aid the marketers in word-of-mouth publicizing; ensuring late adopters buy the product in future. Consumer innovativeness hurries pioneering conduct that enterprises espouse and transmission of novelty Thakur & Jasrai (2018). Consumer innovativeness is the espousal of newfangled services, practices and products. It is the buyer’s inclination to consent to novel things Tellis et al. (2009).

Venkatraman & Price (1990) revealed that innovativeness has the dimensions of cognitive and sensory. Cognitive innovativeness is the propensity to espouse and employ novel products which result in stimulus and exhilaration of the consumer cognizance, as opposed to sensory innovativeness, which is the propensity of the customer to employ products which rouse sensory exhilaration. Studies by Hwang et al. (2021), Caricati & Raimondi (2015) have highlighted the key prompts which lead to consumer purchasing novelties and are advocated to be beneficial for envisaging consumers' pioneering buying conduct. In today’s vibrant environment, patrons spending panaches have become products of social agents, be it family and friends or colleagues and peers or the everlasting impact of the Internet or bombardment through mass media and channels.

As Walsh et al. (2001) highlight, the superfluity of product options and various retail formats, including e-commerce websites, television, litanies, Internet and physical stores at the clearance of Generation Ys create decision-making convolution for the consumer. Hence examining customers’ purchasing progression of newfangled products is paramount. Distinguishing cognitive and sensory innovativeness of customers who have these diverse predilections may have dissimilar espousal behavior and decision-making panaches Venkatraman & Price (1990). In this study, we focus on reconnoitering the shopping slants of pioneering patrons. Categorizing shopping flairs of pioneering patrons will have a substantial part in the victory of marketing strategies. The rest of the paper is structured as follows: In Section 2, we briefly review the literature and the Hypothesis formulated for the study. In section 3, we present the sample, followed by the methodology and our empirical findings. In Section 4, we conclude our study and also highlight the implications and limitations of our study Venkatraman & MacInnis (1985).

Literature Review and Hypothesis Development

Customer decision-making can be pigeonholed into: a) typology (general consumer types) approach Westbrook & Black (1985). b) lifestyle approach Gehrt & Carter (1992), c) psychological (attribute) approach Jain & Sharma (2013). Owing to limitations from the perspective of conceptualization and operationalization of shopping orientation, Sproles and Kendall (1986) pooled all three approaches, i.e., lifestyle, psychological and typology approaches to lessen vagueness and incorporated further attributes and established a consumer decision-making styles (CDMS) list, the ostensible CSI.

Literature on consumer character points out the all-encompassing application of the Consumer Style Inventory (CSI) established by Sproles and Kendall (1986) in Customer decision-making. The coalescing leitmotif among these methods is the precept that all consumers engross in spending with definite vital decision-making manners or panaches comprising of coherent shopping, mindfulness apropos brand, price and quality amid others. The purchaser individualities method appears to be the utmost dominant and expounding as it centers on the mental alignment of customers in the decision-making process.

Consumer innovativeness is regarded as the predilection to explore and buy newfangled and diverse products and brands, unlike merely following conventional consumption designs Venkatraman & Price (1990). Venkatraman & MacInnis (1985) reasoned that customer innovativeness is associated with the longing for novel and diverse proficiencies, unlike new product espousal conduct. Customer innovativeness is defined as “the tendencies of customers to accept new products, whether they are notions, possessions, or services, can show a vital role in theories of brand faithfulness, decision-making predilection, communiqué and espousal process” Hirschman (1980); Cowart et al. (2008); Hussain & Rashidi (2017). Few studies in the literature have endeavored to reconnoiter the precursors and significances of CSI panaches, such as Wesley et al. (2006). Consequently, innovators can be defined as those customers who are continually beholding to some degree novel and keen to alter and espouse newfangled products/services more recurrently and prior to other consumers Truong (2013).

In 2010, Park et al. (2010) considered Consumer Innovativeness as one of the personality attributes of customers. Some studies have also deliberated global innovativeness as a solitary construct, whereas others have Sprotles & Kendall (1986) deliberated it as a multi-dimensional construct involving cognitive and sensory innovativeness Hirunyawipada & Paswan (2006); Park et al. (2010); Jaiyeoba & Opeda (2013); Kuswati (2018). Cognitive innovativeness consumers are those consumers who always look for some newfangled experience where they can use their mental ability, such as problem-solving and puzzles. thinking and mental activities Badowska (2019). On the contrary, sensory innovativeness consumers are those who continually choose those experiences which help them in exciting their senses. These experiences can be internally created, such as daydreaming and fantasy, as well as accessible outside, such as through adventurous activities Maden & Koker (2013); Badowska (2019).

Ultimately, dissimilarities between both types of innovators, in all likelihood, shake customer decision-making flairs at precise as well as overall levels Absari & Joudaki (2018). In our study, we hypothesize that customers with an elevated propensity of cognitive innovativeness will exhibit quality and price mindfulness and confusion by over-choice in their spending flairs. We accordingly hypothesize that:

H1: Customers who have predilections concerning cognitive innovativeness are motivated to have judgement making panaches of (a) perfectionist/high-quality–consciousness, (b) brand mindfulness, (c) newness and fashion mindfulness, (d) recreational and shopping mindfulness, (e) price- mindfulness/ worth for money, (f) impetuous/ inconsiderate, (g) confusion by the plethora of options and (h) habitual/brand faithful orientation to consumption.

H2: Consumers who have predilections concerning sensory innovativeness are motivated to have judgement making panaches of (a) perfectionist/high quality–consciousness, (b) brand mindfulness, (c) newness and fashion mindfulness, (d) recreational and shopping mindfulness, (e) price- mindfulness/ worth for money, (f) impetuous/ inconsiderate, (g) confusion by the plethora of options and (h) habitual/brand faithful orientation to consumption.

Data, Methodology and Empirical Findings

Measures

The data used for the study was collected from a Survey using a Questionnaire which comprised the Consume Style Inventory scales and was used to measure the eight-consumer decision-making styles as given by Sproles and Kendall (1986). The innovativeness scales to measure cognitive and sensory innovativeness was adapted from the work of Venkatraman & Price (1990). The questionnaire also contained questions like age, gender, and income to understand the demographic variables. Unlike the study of Ji Eun Park et al. (2010), we used a five-point Likert scale to measure the items, with 1 implying Strongly Agree to 5 implying Strongly Disagree Li et al. (2015).

Sample

Studies in literature have majorly focused on western countries/cultures. With emerging markets and particularly India being the fastest growing economy in the world with colossal market size, swiftly swelling purchasing power and the assortment of customer segments, it becomes imperative to explore customer innovativeness from the Indian perspective. In this study, the questionnaire was filled in by 300 consumers in the city of Hyderabad, India. After ascribing missing values, the final sample consisted of 260 serviceable responses. There were 78 females, i.e.,30% of the usable sample, and the residual were males. We particularly avoided student samples owing to concerns of generalizability. The sample was chosen based on the community residence area who generally lived in urban areas and contributed in terms of leading in buying goods and services.

Validity of the Scale Items

To measure the usability and appropriateness of the questionnaire, an Explanatory Factor Analysis was performed in the form of Principal Component Analysis with Varimax rotation for data/scale item’s reduction, factor extraction and identification of smaller sets of factors with Eigen values greater than or equal to 1. The scale reliability was also estimated using Cronbach’s alpha an internal consistency measure.

Reliability of the Scale Items

Cronbach’s alpha which is a measure of internal consistency is ought to be greater than .5 for scale to be consistent. The Cronbach’s alpha for this sub-scale is 0.814 as presented in Table 1 and hence it can be said that the internal consistency is maintained in the scale.

Empirical Analysis

Regression Analysis was done to examine the impact of customer innovativeness on several consumers’ shopping flair. In the regression equation, cognitive and sensory innovativeness is taken as an independent variable, and Perfectionist/high quality-conscious, Brand-conscious, Novelty and fashion-conscious, Recreational and shopping conscious, Price-conscious/value for the money, Impulsive/careless, Confusion by over choice, Habitual/brand loyal orientation towards consumption are taken as a dependent variable. Though the R square and adjusted R- square value is not very high, nonetheless, with the ANOVA Model summary table showing that F-value is .000 Significant at a 5 % level, we can investigate further Figure 1.

Figure 1 Coefficients

The beta coefficients of the sensory innovativeness (.283) have a significant impact on the Perfectionist/high-quality-conscious consumer, while no significant relationship was found between cognitive innovativeness and Perfectionist/high-quality-conscious consumer, as presented in Table 2 and Table 3.

Table 4 presents regression results of the impact of the independent variable on the dependent variable, i.e., brand consciousness. The beta coefficient of sensory innovativeness is 0.327 and has a significant impact on brand consciousness, whereas there exists no significant relationship between cognitive innovativeness and brand consciousness Table 5 and Figure 2.

Figure 2 Coefficients

Similarly, we found that cognitive innovativeness has a significant impact on the Recreational and shopping-conscious consumer, whereas there is no significant relation was found between sensory and Recreational and shopping conscious. For the purpose of brevity, other regression results tables have not been presented. We also found that innovativeness has a significant impact on impulsive and careless variables. The study also found that price consciousness/value for money, muddled by over-choice and habitual/loyal brand, displayed no significant relationship. Message by marketers has to effectually kindle cognitive innovativeness attributes and significantly rouse sensory innovativeness traits.

Conclusion

One of the rudimentary philosophies of sustainable marketing is pioneering marketing focusing on probing for novel and superior marketing contributions. Marketers have long acknowledged the importance of innovative consumers as one of the substantial market fragments. One of the ways through which firms try to institute their triumph in the marketplace is by launching and marketing newfangled products proficiently and effectually by aiming at these innovative patrons. Consumer innovativeness is the espousal of newfangled services, practices and products. In this study, we focused on reconnoitering the shopping slants of pioneering patrons. Categorizing shopping flairs of pioneering patrons will have a substantial part in the victory of marketing strategies. The results of the study signpost that sensory and cognitive can lead to some of the shopping flairs of customers, which marketers can capitalize on. Cognitive innovativeness is impelling recreational alignment, while sensory innovativeness is impelling brand consciousness and quality consciousness. Impulsive spending is being stimulated by both innovativeness, i.e. cognitive and sensory. We also found that brand loyalty/habitual shopping, fashion consciousness, price consciousness and confusion by over-choice shows no significant relationship with the shopping flairs. Future research can be done on diverse product categories and other antecedents like personal qualities and behavioral consequences. The study is limited to a small sample from Hyderabad city of India. Other demographics may throw up interesting results.

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Received: 22-Oct-2022, Manuscript No. AMSJ-22-12722; Editor assigned: 25-Oct-2022, PreQC No. AMSJ-22-12722(PQ); Reviewed: 08-Nov-2022, QC No. AMSJ-22-12722; Revised: 28-Nov-2022, Manuscript No. AMSJ-22-12722(R); Published: 07-Dec-2022